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70% of Consumers Prefer The Dentist Over Tech Installs

A new survey reveals self-service as the preferred method for installing new home electronic devices, but complexity is a barrier for many.

70 percent of those surveyed said they would rather visit the dentist than fail at self-installation and have to wait for a technician.

TechSee, a leading SoT (‘Support of Things’) company merging artificial intelligence and augmented reality to streamline technical support, released the results of a wide-ranging survey exploring customer experiences and preferences for in-home electronics installation.

The research revealed self-installation – the process that enables customers to install home electronic devices without the help of a technician or a contact center – was preferred by 71 percent of consumers. While 67 percent of consumers self-installed home electronics in the last 12 months, 30 percent had to abandon their efforts mid-process to contact customer support, costing consumer electronics and telecommunication companies additional time and money, with costly technician dispatches or no fault found refunds, estimated in more than 16 billion USD each year.

The survey further explored consumer sentiment toward new technical support guidance tools, including visual guidance and AI-powered virtual assistance. These are the survey’s key findings:

Respondents preferred self-installation over any other support model: 68 percent of consumers are willing to spend more than 15 minutes trying to self-install in order to avoid contacting a call center. 70 percent would rather visit their dentist than fail at self-installation and wait for a technician.

Complexity is a barrier to mass adoption of self-installation: 59 percent of respondents did not find the installation process easy. Baby Boomers were the demographic that struggled the most with self-installation (87 percent).

Consumers prefer “visual guidance”: 71 percent of consumers said they prefer pictures, videos, and visual prompts over other any other methods such as user manuals or online forums.

People like using their smartphones as instruction guides: The majority of respondents preferred to receive instructions via their smartphones, and 28 percent prefer receiving help via virtual assistants such as Siri and Alexa.

“As technology becomes a commodity in our homes, the traditional customer support model does not scale economically or organizationally to meet the greater need for assistance driven by the exponential growth of smart devices,” said Eitan Cohen, CEO of TechSee. “Organizations realize that they need better tools to engage their customers at scale. TechSee’s AI-powered Visual Assistance platform empowers consumers to install and operate their devices without the need to call for assistance or read manuals. Technical guidance is simply teleported to their mobile device and visually augmented into their environment, creating a simple visual and interactive customer experience.”

“The Survey results reconfirm what we all know. Consumers don’t like to call tech support or wait for a technician. They’d rather do things themselves if they had the right knowledge and tools. TechSee makes that possible with its Virtual Technical Assistant powered by AI & Augmented Reality to bring technical expertise to the masses,” Cohen said. “TechSee empowers consumers to install and operate their devices without the need to call for assistance or read manuals. Technical guidance is simply teleported to their mobile device and visually augmented into their environment, creating a simple visual and interactive customer experience.”

The “Internet of Things” is the buzzword for an increasingly networked world where everything from the garage door to the coffee machine is assigned an IP address. As the “IoT” matures, and the range and complexity of connected devices multiplies, there will be an increasing need for assistance with installations. With the inevitable shift to self-service, self-installation becomes a move necessary to enhance the customer experience and reduce costs.

TechSee is a global leader in visual support technologies for the smart home. TechSee revolutionizes the customer support domain by providing the first intelligent visual support solution powered by artificial intelligence and augmented reality. The company empowers technical support teams across the globe to execute visually-interactive remote diagnoses and resolutions of problems. They are building a massive database of interactions and resolutions to enable customers to experience rapid, fully automated, robotic visual resolution of technical issues via their smartphones. TechSee is headquartered in Tel Aviv with offices in New York and Madrid.